1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to refrigerators and clear ice makers.
2. Description of the Related Art
Refrigerators and coolers for the cold storage of food and beverage items are well known. Typical residential ice makers form ice cubes by depositing water into a mold attached to an evaporator or the freezer compartment and allowing the water to freeze in a sedentary state. Such an approach results in clouded ice cubes as a result of the entrapped air and impurities in the water.
It is known that forming ice by flowing water over a freezing surface will eliminate the clouding associated with sedentary freezing. Such a flowing water process has typically been used in commercial ice cube makers. One example of the flowing water approach is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,586,439; this patent and all others mentioned herein are hereby incorporated by reference as though fully set forth herein. In this patent, water is flowed over a vertically disposed evaporator plate whose surface defines pockets. The water cascades over the surfaces of the pockets and an ice cube is formed in each pocket. The ice cubes are harvested by passing hot vaporous refrigerant through the evaporator in place of the cold refrigerant. The resulting ice cubes are nearly transparent and not cloudy due to the particulate contaminates in the water being heavier than the water and falling from the evaporator before freezing and forming part of the ice cube. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,058,731 and 6,148,621 disclose compact clear ice maker units incorporating such cascading water evaporator plates.
These machines are separate from conventional full-size or compact refrigerators. It is well known for the freezer sections of some of these conventional refrigerators to include ice makers of the regular, non-clear, variety. U.S. Pat. No. 4,872,317 shows and describes a refrigeration unit having a built-in conventional type ice maker. As is conventional, this patented unit includes a molded tray type ice maker in the freezer section of the unit with a mechanical actuator to dispense and harvest the ice. Such ice makers are used in conventional refrigeration units because they are self contained, needing only a water supply line, and because they can produce ice in a unit having only one evaporator that cools both the freezer and refrigerator compartments.